A BOMBSHELL report reveals “fresh” evidence proving Lucy Letby didn’t kill any babies, according to her lawyers.
Mark McDonald told reporters the convicted child serial killer has “a new hope” as he visited the Birmingham offices of the Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC).
SWNSKiller nurse Lucy Letby was convicted of ruthlessly murdering seven babies in her care[/caption]
GettySome insist Letby has been made a scapegoat for hospital failings[/caption]
PAHuman rights barrister Mark McDonald[/caption]
He was there to deliver the full findings of a 14-strong international panel of neonatologists and paediatric specialists who say poor medical care and natural causes were the reasons for babies collapsing at the Countess of Chester Hospital neonatal unit.
Also passed to the CCRC, which investigates potential miscarriages of justice, was a separate report from seven medics which claims the results of insulin tests on two infants, which a jury concluded Letby poisoned, were unreliable.
Letby, 35, from Hereford, is serving 15 whole-life orders after she was convicted across two trials at Manchester Crown Court of murdering seven babies and attempting to murder seven others, with two attempts on one of her victims, between June 2015 and June 2016.
Speaking to reporters on Thursday, Mr McDonald said the new evidence “blows the case out the water”.
“Today I’ve put in 23 expert reports from 24 experts from across the realm covering eight separate countries,” he said.
“Those expert reports completely demolish the prosecution’s case that was put before the jury.
“It is now hoped that the CCRC will not take long to look at this evidence and refer it back to the Court of Appeal.
“These reports show that no crime was committed… This blows the case out the water.
“I’m absolutely confident that the expert evidence that has appeared post-conviction totally undermines the safety of the conviction.
“I’m very confident that we’re going to get back to the Court of Appeal.”
Asked how Letby “is doing”, he said: “I don’t talk about Lucy herself as a person but to say this: She’s read all the reports, she’s seen the reports, we have a new hope now.
“A new hope that, in fact, the truth will come out. So yes, she has a new hope.”
Last month, lawyers for the families of Letby’s victims rubbished the international panel’s findings as “full of analytical holes” and “a rehash” of the defence case heard at trial.
Mr McDonald also gave the CCRC a separate report on the insulin cases of Child F and Child L from seven experts including two consultant neonatalogists, a retired professor in forensic toxicology and a paediatric endocrinologist.
Their report summary concluded the jury was misled in a number of “important areas” including medical and evidential facts, and that key information on the insulin testing procedure was not submitted.
It added that the biomechanical test used in both cases “can give rise to falsely high insulin results” due to the presence of antibodies which can interfere with the outcome.
On Thursday, Mr McDonald released the independent panel’s case summaries of all 17 babies that were said by trial prosecutors to have been deliberately harmed on the Countess of Chester Hospital’s neonatal unit.
Medical experts provided case summaries on all 17 babies from the Letby trial
An international panel of medical experts has provided case summaries on all 17 babies who featured in the 10-month trial of Lucy Letby.
The 14-strong panel concluded that no criminal offences had been committed at the Countess of Chester Hospital in 2015 and 2016 and instead provided alternative causes of deterioration:
– Baby 1 (known as Child A in the trial): The prosecution said the boy was murdered by an injection of air into the bloodstream which caused an air embolism where bubbles form and block the blood supply. The panel found no evidence of air embolism and said the child had died from thrombosis, where a blood clot forms in a vessel.
– Baby 2 (Child B): The prosecution said Letby attempted to murder Child A’s twin sister by also injecting air into her bloodstream. The panel found no evidence of air embolism and said the child had collapsed from thrombosis.
– Baby 3 (Child C): The prosecution said the boy was murdered with air forced down his feeding tube and into his stomach. The panel said the child died following ineffective resuscitation from a collapse after an “acute small bowel obstruction” that went unrecognised.
– Baby 4 (Child D): The prosecution said the girl was murdered by an injection of air into the bloodstream. The panel found no evidence of air embolism and ruled the child died of systemic sepsis, pneumonia and disseminated intravascular coagulation (blood clotting). Issues with failures to give relevant antibiotics were also identified.
– Baby 5 (Child E): The Crown said Letby murdered the twin boy with an injection of air into the bloodstream and she also deliberately caused bleeding to the infant. The panel said there was no evidence of air embolism and bleeding was caused either by a lack of oxygen pre-birth or a congenital blood vessel condition.
– Baby 6 (Child F): The prosecution said Letby attempted to murder Child E’s twin brother by administering insulin. The panel ruled that the child’s insulin levels and insulin/C-peptide ratio did not prove that exogenous insulin was used and were within the norm for pre-term infants. It added that there was poor medical management of the child’s prolonged hypoglycaemia.
– Baby 7 (Child G): The prosecution said Letby attempted to murder the girl by overfeeding her with milk and forcing air down her feeding tube. The panel said there was no evidence to support air injection into the stomach or overfeeding. The infant’s vomiting and clinical deterioration was due to infection, it found.
– Baby 8 (Child H): Jurors cleared Letby of one count of attempted murder and failed to reach a verdict on a second count. Prosecutors said the nurse sabotaged the girl’s care in some way which led to two profound oxygen desaturations. The panel said the deteriorations were due to medical mismanagement of a tension pneumothorax where air is trapped between the lung and chest wall.
– Baby 9 (Child I): The prosecution said Letby murdered the infant by injecting air into her bloodstream and stomach. The panel said it found no evidence of air injections and that the baby died of breathing complications caused by respiratory distress syndrome and chronic lung disease.
– Baby 10 (Child J): Jurors could not reach a verdict on an allegation of attempted murder. No specific form of harm was identified by the prosecution but they said Letby did something to cause the collapse of the girl. The panel said the deterioration was caused by sepsis and there was no evidence to support malicious airway obstruction.
– Baby 11 (Child K): The prosecution said Letby attempted to murder the girl by deliberately dislodging her breathing tube. Among its findings the panel said there was no evidence to support a dislodged endotracheal tube (ETT) and the clinical deterioration was caused by use of an undersized ETT.
– Baby 12 (Child L): The Crown said the nurse poisoned the boy with insulin. The panel said the infant’s insulin-related levels were within the norm for pre-term infants and there was no evidence of deliberate administration.
– Baby 13 (Child M): Prosecutors said Letby attempted to murder Child L’s twin brother by injecting air into his bloodstream. The panel said there was no evidence of air embolism and his collapse was caused by sepsis or a heart problem.
– Baby 14 (Child N): The Crown said the boy was the victim of attempted murder by inflicted trauma in his throat and an air injection into his bloodstream. The panel said there was no air embolism and it was likely his blood oxygen levels dropped due to his haemophilia condition or routine cares, which was “exacerbated” by repeated attempts to insert a breathing tube.
– Baby 15 (Child O): The prosecution said Letby murdered the triplet boy by injecting air into his bloodstream and inflicting trauma to his liver. The panel said he died from liver damage caused by traumatic delivery, resulting in bleeding in the abdomen and profound shock.
– Baby 16 (Child P): Prosecutors said Letby murdered Child O’s brother by injecting him with air. The panel said there was no evidence to support that mechanism and that he died from a collapsed lung that was “suboptimally managed”.
– Baby 17 (Child Q): Jurors could not reach a verdict on an allegation of attempted murder. The Crown said Letby attempted to murder the boy by injecting liquid, and possibly air, down his feeding tube. The panel said there was no evidence to support air injection into the stomach and the child deteriorated because he had early symptoms of a serious gastrointestinal problem, or sepsis.
The 14-strong panel concluded that no criminal offences had been committed at the Countess of Chester Hospital in 2015 and 2016 and instead provided alternative causes of deterioration.
Among the findings of the panel, working pro bono for Letby’s defence team, was that baby boy Child C died following ineffective resuscitation from a collapse after an “acute small bowel obstruction” that went unrecognised, rather than from a deliberate administration of air.
Child P, a triplet boy, was also found by the jury to have been fatally injected with air but the panel ruled he died from a collapsed lung that was “suboptimally managed”.
Letby’s experts said there was no evidence of air embolism – in which bubbles form and block the blood supply – in Child E, a twin boy, and that bleeding was not caused by inflicted trauma but from either a lack of oxygen pre-birth or a congenital blood vessel condition.
The panel said insulin-related levels for Child E’s brother, Child F, insulin were within the norm for preterm infants and it did not prove that synthetic insulin was administered.
The same conclusion was reached for Child L, another twin boy that Letby was convicted of attempting to murder by insulin poisoning, and both cases were said to have involved sub-standard medical management of hypoglycaemia.
Letby lost two bids last year to challenge her convictions at the Court of Appeal, in May for seven murders and seven attempted murders, and in October for the attempted murder of a baby girl which she was convicted of by a different jury at a retrial.
Lady Justice Thirlwall is due to publish in November the findings from the public inquiry into how the former nurse was able to commit her crimes.
In written submissions to the inquiry, Richard Baker KC, said families of Letby’s victims were concerned that medical evidence was being presented at press conferences.
Cheshire Constabulary is continuing a review of deaths and non-fatal collapses of babies at the neonatal units of the Countess of Chester Hospital and the Liverpool Women’s Hospital during Letby’s time as a nurse from 2012 to 2016.
The charges Letby was convicted on in full
Child A, allegation of murder. The Crown said Letby injected air intravenously into the bloodstream of the baby boy. COUNT 1 GUILTY.
Child B, allegation of attempted murder. The Crown said Letby attempted to murder the baby girl, the twin sister of Child A, by injecting air into her bloodstream. COUNT 2 GUILTY.
Child C, allegation of murder. Prosecutors said Letby forced air down a feeding tube and into the stomach of the baby boy. COUNT 3 GUILTY.
Child D, allegation of murder. The Crown said air was injected intravenously into the baby girl. COUNT 4 GUILTY.
Child E, allegation of murder. The Crown said Letby murdered the twin baby boy with an injection of air into the bloodstream and also deliberately caused bleeding to the infant. COUNT 5 GUILTY.
Child F, allegation of attempted murder. Letby was said by prosecutors to have poisoned the twin brother of Child E with insulin. COUNT 6 GUILTY.
Child G, three allegations of attempted murder. The Crown said Letby targeted the baby girl by overfeeding her with milk and pushing air down her feeding tube. COUNT 7 GUILTY, COUNT 8 GUILTY, COUNT 9 NOT GUILTY.
Child H, two allegations of attempted murder. Prosecutors said Letby sabotaged the care of the baby girl in some way which led to two profound oxygen desaturations. COUNT 10 NOT GUILTY, COUNT 11 JURY COULD NOT REACH VERDICT.
Child I, allegation of murder. The prosecution said Letby killed the baby girl at the fourth attempt and had given her air and overfed her with milk. COUNT 12 GUILTY.
Child J, allegation of attempted murder. No specific form of harm was identified by the prosecution but they said Letby did something to cause the collapse of the baby girl. COUNT 13 JURY COULD NOT REACH VERDICT.
Child K, allegation of attempted murder. The prosecution said Letby compromised the baby girl as she deliberately dislodged a breathing tube. COUNT 14 JURY COULD NOT REACH VERDICT.
Child L, allegation of attempted murder. The Crown said the nurse poisoned the twin baby boy with insulin. COUNT 15 GUILTY.
Child M, allegation of attempted murder. Prosecutors said Letby injected air into the bloodstream of Child L’s twin brother. COUNT 16 GUILTY.
Child N, three allegations of attempted murder. The Crown said Letby inflicted trauma in the baby boy’s throat and also injected him with air in the bloodstream. COUNT 17 GUILTY, COUNT 18 JURY COULD NOT REACH VERDICT, COUNT 19 JURY COULD NOT REACH VERDICT.
Child O, allegation of murder. Prosecutors say Letby attacked the triplet boy by injecting him with air, overfeeding him with milk and inflicting trauma to his liver with “severe force”. COUNT 20 GUILTY.
Child P, allegation of murder. Prosecutors said the nurse targeted the triplet brother of Child O by overfeeding him with milk, injecting air and dislodging his breathing tube. COUNT 21 GUILTY.
Child Q, allegation of attempted murder. The Crown said Letby injected the baby boy with liquid, and possibly air, down his feeding tube. COUNT 22 JURY COULD NOT REACH VERDICT.
Letby said ‘I’m innocent’ as she was led from the dock when she was sentencedAFP
PALucy’s parents John and Susan Letby outside Manchester Crown Court ahead of the verdict in her first case[/caption]
Andrew Price / View Finder PicturesThe road in Chester where Letby previously lived[/caption]
Derbyshire ConstabularyFootage released by police shows the moment Letby was arrested[/caption]
Derbyshire ConstabularyShe lied to police in her interview back in 2018[/caption]
PAA court sketch of Letby during one of her trials[/caption] Published: [#item_custom_pubDate]
